Google alerts visitors of a Tsunami in the East-Asian region due to earthquake in Japan

Just saw this on Google homepage. The text reads -

Tsunami Alert for New Zealand, the Philippines, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Hawaii, and others. Waves expected over the next few hours, caused by 8.9 earthquake in Japan.

Looks like Google has realized that it’s homepage is a great way to alert people worldwide about calamities that have taken place/are going to take place.

Update:

We advise people in the affected areas to remain safe. The scale of the earthquake is a staggering 8.9 and according to some news outlets it’s the biggest in Japan’s 140 year history!

• Find people who are lost in the Japan’s earthquake and Tsunami using this Google website.
• Keep yourself updated by visiting alerts and warnings from the US government’s website – Weather.gov
• See places affected, electric blackouts, realtime map and other media on Google’s Crisis Response website.
• Realtime tweets about the Tsunami from Twitter (Twitter seems to be a little slow due too all the requests & tweets being broadcast)
• Microsoft doesn’t get much attention these days but they’re trying in their own way – go to Microsoft disaster response website for real-time imagery, before and after maps, etc. They’re even donating $1 for every tweet upto $100K. Kudos to them!

Charlie Simpson raised more than £86,000 for Haiti

If you’re in the loop you must be aware of the scale of disaster Haiti is in right now following the magnitude 7 earthquake that killed almost 100K 150K people.

But at times like these when hopes seem to shatter a kid named Charlie who is no more than 7 has raised about £86,000+ which is an astounding amount. Charlie originally intended to raise £500 but he is now 17221% (at the time of writing) ahead of his initial goal.

Charlie lives in London, UK. When he saw the pictures of the earthquake survivors in Haiti he told his parents that he’d like to organize a fund-raising event in the form of a bike-a-thon in his local park in London. The amount was collected for UNICEF and it has been nothing but amazing given that Charlie Simpson is no celebrity nor is he related to any.

Charlie covered 5 miles (8 kms) by cycling in South Park in Fulham with his dad and a friend.

The coverage of the event by BBC gave such a boost to his effort that people from all over the world are showering cheers by giving donations and spreading the word.

By accomplishing this Herculean task Charlies has created a record of donations collected in a single day.

The only inference I can get from this event is that the smallest of changes can make a big impact. Every effort counts!

US Sen. Scott Brown

Sen Scott Brown made headlines the world over when he won the seat which was predominantly Democratic seat for the past 47 years!

If you asked Sen Scott Brown about his success he’d surely give it all to his voters which he should but one of the reasons he was able to pull a majority win over the seat was his clever suse of the internet.

It is no brainer how important social media and other creative forms of reaching people have become lately. The Obama win certainly underlined the importance. Youtube. Flickr. Twitter. Google ads. He used them all to create an awareness a movement which ultimately lead to his win.

Scott Brown used similar tactics to reach his voter using creative, well-crafted. geographically targeted Google ads to enroll volunteers, collect donations and get votes.

Because Google offers an array of sophisticated tools to its advertisers – be it selecting audience within a certain geographical range by zip code or creating separate messages based on demographics and not to forget the ability to track performace of these campaigns the investment on these campaigns was a hit right from the start.

Google’s Mr Panger said that if you were located in Massachusetts you’d see a Scott Brown ad all the time on sites that were a part of Google’s content network. Of course, you could only see those ads if you were located in Massachusetts as they were geographically targeted to his voters location.

I am glad that public figures have started embracing the tools of technology to reach out the people. If only they realize the importance of staying in touch with these tools America would have better, quicker and less complex policies and also satisfied people.

via WSJ

BloggersUnite for Haiti

Haiti, one of the poorest countries in the Western Hemisphere has been hit by a scale 7 earthquake. Authorities predict the casualties might well be in the north of 50,000.  The country has had a harsh and unstable history. Most people in Haiti live on less than $2/day and unemployment is rampant.

At such an unfortunate time, it is our moral duty to help those in need. Every little bit helps no matter how small. And you don’t even have to do anything special like going there for volunteering you can provide help by making donations to NGO and other volunteering organizations.

If that is not possible you can also do your bit by spreading the word using your social presence like Facebook, Twitter, social bookmarking, blogging and even a combination of these. It is at such times that we as humans must unite and what better platform than social media?

Please email, tweet, fb your friends and request them to come forward for help.

Here are some of the ways that you can provide your help in the form of donations -

- The first organization that comes to mind when any calamity is encountered is The Red Cross. You can make financial donations to The Red Cross International Relief Fund by calling 1-800-RED-CROSS or online at http://www.redcross.org

- You can also text “HAITI” to “90999″ and it will make a donation of $10 to the American Red Cross to help with the relief efforts. It’ll be deducted from your mobile’s prepaid balance or will be added to your next bil if you’re on a post-paid plan.

- To donate $5 to Wyclef Jean’s Haitian Yele charity, text “Yele” to 501501. The money will be added to your next phone bill.

- To find out how to help the International Rescue Committee,visithttp://www.theIRC.org or call toll free, 1-877-REFUGEE.

- To donate through Oxfam’s emergency appeal, visit http://www.oxfam.org.uk

Google has a page known as Google Crisis Response with more information - http://www.google.com/relief/haitiearthquake/

If you’re a blogger please visit BloggersUnite for Haiti web page for other useful links and information. I’ll try to update this page often. If you’ve got any useful piece of information kindly share it in the comments. I’ll even include it in the main post if you want (including links to your blog or twitter or whatever).